Stephen Hearnden

THE HISTORY OF MOBILE COMMUNICATIONS

It seems inconceivable that mobile communication is barely 50 years old. Here, Stephen Hearnden charts the progress from the early radiopaging services right through to the present day and provides a flavour of what we can expect in the future. He also explores the societal changes that have occurred with the advent of near-universal use of mobile devices.

THE EARLY DAYS for more characters became essential only nine frequency channels though! It is impossible to underestimate the and the Post Office developed a stan- It’s hard to imagine only nine calls be- importance of mobile communica- dard giving a capacity of 80 alpha- ing made in London at the same time! tions and how they have changed our numeric characters; but again it was To operate, a mobile call was initi- lives. From the ability to make and only one-way. In the 1980s there ated by lifting the handset, manually receive calls almost anywhere in the were around 3.2 million users of pag- selecting a free channel and pressing world seamlessly, to being able to ac- ers worldwide and by the 1990s this the call button (specific channels were cess the Internet whilst on the move, peaked at around 22 million. Then, used in specific areas, busy channels of the many inventions of the last 50 with the advent of cellular, the services were indicated by an engaged light years, mobile communication must be began to decline and, although there To call a mobile from a fixed tele- near the top in the effect it has had on were newer paging services including phone it was necessary to call the ra- people’s lives. two-way ones, they only continued as diophone operator by dialling 140 (in The first mobile communication a niche service. Hutchinson's (now London) and requesting the 5-digit services that became available were 3 in the UK) national paging service number of the mobile to which you developed in the early 1970s in the UK closed in 2000. wished to be connected. The opera- and a little earlier in the US. These In parallel with the roll-out of pag- tor would key in the number which were one-way paging services that ing services there were attempts to would be transmitted using a 5-tone sent a telephone number to a user in develop radiophone services. These, sequence to all mobiles on the calling the field with a small pocket pager. like the paging services, were limited channel. Some of these services were limited to in their capabilities and also suffered Radiophone 3, the successor ser- a site, for example a hospital or uni- from a lack of frequency spectrum. vice, had 55 channels and, although it versity campus, and some were re- Radiophone System 1, the very first was a manual system, it was still an gionally based. public mobile telephone service in the operator-connected half duplex sys- This required the operator who UK, was made available in 1959. It tem. It was replaced by Radiophone was paging the individual to know was of limited capacity and provided 4 in 1983 which was an automatic ser- what region the person was in. As coverage in the South Lancashire area. vice. In both cases to ring the phone it was a one-way service with no ac- It was not until 1965 that service it was necessary to know in which re- knowledgement, the operator had no was made available in London. The gion the called party was located. To idea whether the message had been launch coincided with the opening of increase capacity, the channel spacing received. Soon there became a de- the Post Office Tower which was the was reduced from 25 to 12.5kHz which mand for a national service and the location for the base station transmit- gave a total of 95 channels. It didn’t Post Office (PO) in the UK deployed a ters covering the central London area. take long with the erlang tables to see network of paging sites and offered a The launch of System 2 saw the be- that the total capacity was limited to national service. ginning of the ever-increasing rise in around 10 –15,000 users. There were As the service developed, the need popularity of the mobile phone. It had many more but these were illegal! It

#! !!" !! 9ROXPH3DUW‡ #$%!&'()*+,!'-!#$%!.*/#.#(#%!'-!#%,%0'11(*.0+#.'*/!2)'-%//.'*+,/ was said in those days that, because allocated the 900MHz band for a pan- there was a long waiting list for ser- European cellular radio system and vice, the PO had developed waiting list allowed countries to offer interim ser- management into an art form. It was vices in these bands. Therefore the clear another solution had to be found. frequency bands selected were 890 to 905 and 935 to 950MHz. An addition- CELLULAR - THE EARLY YEARS al 10 +10MHz was reserved for what In May 1982 Kenneth Baker, the was to become the Global System for Minister of State for Information and Mobile (GSM) communications direct- Technology in the Department for ly above these bands. Cellnet opted Trade and Industry, received a joint for a 12-cell repeat pattern at launch approach from Securicor (a parcels moving to a 4-cell repeat pattern after delivery company) and BT Enterprises about two years and used Motorola By the 1990s there were some to form a joint company subsequently equipment. Racal Vodafone opted for 22 million people using pagers. known as Telecom Securicor Cellular a 7-cell repeat pattern using Ericsson Radio Ltd (Cellnet) with a request to equipment. GSM AND 3G offer a UK nationwide cellular service. The operators weren’t allowed to The standard for GSM was started in The venture was 51% owned by BT offer service to the end customer at 1983 and by 1987 the parameters for and 49% by Securicor and subse- that time so a network of service pro- the air interface were decided, allow- quently became 60/40%. viders and dealers was established, ing European countries to start in ear- During this time telecommunica- most selling on both networks. The nest planning for new digital cellular tions regulation changed and, with the opening tariffs were £25 per month radio networks. At that time only a new Telecommunications Act 1983, and 25 pence per minute. Allowing few countries had competition, most this opened up the market to com- for inflation these figures are very only had the incumbent PTT op- petition for the first time. Another high by today’s standards. erator. However, by the time of the company, Racal Vodafone, bid for the As a personal aside, I joined Cell- 1992 launch of GSM in the UK, most second licence which was granted in net six weeks after the launch when countries launched with two opera- 1983 and two years later the two op- we had one mobile switching centre tors. Germany had an aggressive erators launched within days of each in the network and eight base stations new entrant operator that was anx- other in January 1985. The licences with 1500 customers (February 1985). ious to steal a march on the Deutche were granted for 25 years. The business plan I inherited showed Telecom, the incumbent operator, In the two years leading up to the a growth of 20,000 customers by 1995 but was stymied by the lack of type- launch there was intense activity to (10 years) but we exceeded that in approved mobiles leading to GSM be- decide on a standard and to free-up seven months. Racal Vodafone had ing renamed ‘God Send Mobiles’! spectrum for the two operators. Much similar growth. It was clear that both Originally it was seen that up to of the research work on the air inter- operators had dramatically under- 18 countries would adopt GSM in Eu- face standard was done at the BT re- estimated the market possibly due to rope, but in the event it has become a search laboratories in Suffolk. The re- the pent-up demand that couldn’t be truly global standard with operators sults were presented to a joint industry satisfied by older radiotelephone sys- now in 219 countries. It is a credit Government group run by the Depart- tems. to the designers of the standard that ment for Trade and Industry. Even with high tariffs and a sub- it has been capable of expansion, Several existing standards were in- sequent increase in the per-minute not only in terms of numbers of cus- vestigated including the Nordic Mobile charge inside the M25 (the London or- tomers, but in terms of numbers of Telephone standard (NMT450/900) bital motorway) to choke off conges- networks it can support with roam- and the North American Advance Mo- tion (unsuccessfully), the customer ing. The key improvements of GSM bile Phone service (AMPs) standard. base continued to grow and, at a peak, over TACS was the security from Eventually it was decided to adapt the the networks had around 1.5 million overhearing and cloning it offered, AMPs standard for European use, i.e. customers each. Network investment as well as better aural quality, capac- a 25kHz not a 30kHz channel plan to ran at £200m per year and, after three ity for the operators, a text messag- fit in with European practice. This be- years, additional spectrum was found, ing capability and of course roam- came known as TACS - Total Access termed Extended TACS, which gave ing. Also, the use of the Subscriber Communications System. It was an each operator a total of 660 channels. Identity Module (SIM) card allows analogue technology using Frequency The service by today’s standards was the subscription to the service to be Division Multiplex with a digital call not brilliant with dropped calls and decoupled from the handset. set-up technology and a simple ana- overhearing being a major source of Text messaging, which was a by- logue tone call clearing technology. customer dissatisfaction. That was af- product of the design, was and still Each operator was granted 300 fre- ter the operators had managed to give is the most profitable service offered quency channels with a national cov- a reasonable coverage footprint. It by the operators. The A5 security erage obligation. was clear that, without new technol- algorithm which provides the user In 1983, the Commission of Euro- ogy, these networks would run out of with security was, at the time of pean Post and Telecommunications steam; a new solution was required. its launch, the strongest cypher in

!9ROXPH3DUW‡ !! "!! #" commercial use. Even after 20 years, it has a Time Division Duplex capabil- screen. This decade has seen the birth it still provides a secure function and, ity as well, very few if any operators of the smartphone with Blackberry, although there have been papers pub- have adopted it in a big way Apple, Samsung and Nokia battling lished on how to attack it, in practice In 2000 came the 3G auction. By it out in the marketplace for the share the service still remains pretty secure. now governments and regulators were of a burgeoning market. Phones have GSM is a Time Division Multiple beginning to recognise the value of developed with a number of different Access (TDMA) system based on In- the spectrum and, rather than going operating systems such as Symbian tegrated Services Digital Network for a straight beauty competition, the now fading away to be replaced by (ISDN) at the network level. Each spectrum award was based on an auc- proprietary systems offered by Apple radio frequency carrier, which is tion. The spectrum for 3G in the UK and Blackberry with Samsung and 200kHz, supports eight voice chan- are the bands 1885 to 2025MHz for others plumping for Android and nels. Terrestrial GSM now covers the mobile-to-base (uplink) and 2110 Nokia opting for Windows 8. In par- 90% of the world’s population. Its to 2200MHz for the base-to-mobile allel with this smartphone explosion, data capability has evolved since its (downlink). There were five lots of we have seen apps developers coming launch from simple data at 9.6kbit/s, varying sizes and after 100 rounds the up with brand new programmes that through General Packet Radio Service existing four operators plus 3 were we didn’t think we would need but at 40kbit/s, to Enhanced Data-rates for awarded the lots at a total cost of we now can’t do without. Bus map Global Evolution at up to 384kbit/s. £22.4Bn. The industry was stunned. timetables, National Rail, Facebook, All these upgrades required careful Not only did the UK Government get Twitter, BBC - you can all name your planning to ensure backwards com- more revenue than they could ever favourites. All for a bundled package patibility with older equipment. New have imagined, but the effect of taking of about £20-30 per month. A far cry GSM networks are still being installed this money out of industry delayed the from the £25 and 25p tariff of 1985! in some parts of the world and it is network roll-out by the operators for a No wonder 43% of all new phones expected that they will continue to be number of years. sold or rented in the UK currently are used well into the 2020s. 3G, if we are honest, has not been smartphones. The sheer scale and In parallel with the roll-out by as successful as GSM and has taken choice just shows how a truly com- Cellnet (now O2) and Vodafone of about 10 years to become fully func- petitive market can work. GSM the UK Government decided in tional and, as with all these things, around 1990 it wanted more mobile during that time people have been 4G AND BEYOND network operator competition; Mer- busily preparing for the next standard What does the future hold for mobile cury 1 to 1 and Orange were awarded called 4G or Long Term Evolution communication - and in particular mo- licenses. A third operator was initially (LTE). However 3G does offer the bile broadband (as that is where the licensed but the licence was handed ability to deliver internet functionality action now is and will continue to back and the spectrum was eventually to the handset. Another problem that be in the future)? The next round of reassigned. The standard they chose has become apparent; other countries spectrum auctions is scheduled for 4th to use was GSM1800, a similar stan- outside of Europe often use different quarter 2012 after a two year delay. dard to GSM (now renamed GSM900) frequency bands due to the composi- Without taking sides, this is the most which allowed fully interoperability tion of the ITU international frequency complicated auction the UK regulator, between the networks with dual-band tables. As the commonality of fre- Ofcom, has attempted, as it has been phones. quency bands has become more diffi- subject to numerous legal challenges A 4-operator market in the UK pre- cult, the need for multi-band handsets which are partly the reason for the de- vailed until the arrival of Hutchinson to support GSM 850/900/1800 and 3G lay. The spectrum at 800 and 2.6GHz 3G (now known as 3) following the 900/1800/2100/2600 has become vi- will be packaged and, assuming the 3G auction (of which more later). tal. auction goes ahead, we expect to see Like all things it became time to When 3G was first launched data the 4G networks rolling out in 2015. move on to the next standard name- rates struggled to reach 1Mbit/s. If These will offer more and higher ca- ly 3G or Universal Mobile Telecom- this was shared between a number pacity which will be required to do munications System (UMTS) as it is of customers the user experience was more of the heavy lifting as mobile be- sometimes known. Even before GSM poor. As the standard evolved, with comes the broadband delivery vehicle was launched in 1992 R&D engineers more advanced coding technologies of choice for the young. were busy designing the GSM replace- for the air interface, 16QAM (Quadra- ment standard, only this time it was ture Amplitude Modulation) moving SOCIETAL IMPACT being led by manufacturers and not to 64QAM and the use of smart anten- It is quite clear that mobile commu- operators. This has led to some criti- nas, the rate improved to 14.4Mbit/s. nication has changed the way people cal comment that 3G is overly com- Operators are understandably cau- live and work. No longer are people plicated and expensive and isn’t end tious because of the costs involved. tied to the house or the work place but user friendly. 3G does, however, of- In the last three years, this increase in are free to conduct their lives where fer more capacity than GSM as well as system capacity has transformed the ever they want. In fact many people higher data rates. It is a Code Division mobile market. No longer was the would find it impossible to have their Multiple Access (CDMA) Frequency customer faced with a small 2-tone current life style without the mobile Division Duplex system and, although screen or at most a 3 x 3cm colour phone. This ranges from the single

## !!" !! 9ROXPH3DUW‡ #$%!&'()*+,!'-!#$%!.*/#.#(#%!'-!#%,%0'11(*.0+#.'*/!2)'-%//.'*+,/ parent juggling child care and their job benefits- especially with the number is scheduled to overtake fixed use by to the sales executive who is constant- of apps available on smartphones. 2014 and this has already happened in ly in touch with their customers all Many of us have apps which add value the less developed markets. over the world. In Africa for example to our lives and couldn’t imagine how The other explosion in the mobile the mobile is becoming all-pervasive, we ever did without mobile communi- communications market that is increas- more so than TV, and is used for com- cations. Banking and shopping using ingly being exploited by people is the munication between the young, for a mobile device is increasing and is set use of WiFi to complement the use of farmers to check on crop prices to op- to take over from the laptop over the mobile, either via the home or office timise harvesting time, to use for mi- next few years. By the end of this year broadband or increasingly through cro payments where banks are scarce. there will be over 6bn mobile subscrip- public WiFi hotspots. Even as I am The young too are dependent on tions worldwide. Ericsson forecasts writing this, [August 2012] M&S is mak- their phones and many say it is the de- that mobile subscriptions will reach ing WiFi available in stores to allow vice they could least do without. 9bn in 2017 of which 5bn will be mo- customers to compare prices and look There are, of course, many bile broadband connections. Mobile at what is available or on special offer.

AUTHOR'S CONCLUSIONS

Mobile communications has come same but bigger and better and more In this short article it is difficult to a long way since those early paging innovative. The only constraint in do justice to a subject that has radi- systems and many of us would have the very long term is the finite avail- cally changed our lives over the last found it impossible to believe just ability of spectrum but, although the half century and is set to change lives how the market has developed over engineers can’t break the laws of even more in the future. Hopefully the last 50 years. The future is impos- physics, there are more techniques the article has given you an insight sible to predict but, unless someone being developed all the time that will into the world of mobile communica- invents extra-sensory perception, the eke out the spectrum in the future to tions and what it means for mankind. mobile market will be more of the provide even more capacity.

ABBREVIATIONS

AMPs Advance Mobile Phone service CDMA Code Division Multiple Access GSM Global System for Mobile ISDN Integrated Services Digital Network LTE Long Term Evolution PO Post Office QAM Quadrature Amplitude Modulation SIM Subscriber Identity Module TACS Total Access Communications System TDMA Time Division Multiple Access UMTS Universal Mobile Telecommunications System

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Stephen Hearnden has a career spanning over 40 years in the ICT sector. He has recently taken over the role of Director of Technology in October 2012. Before that he joined Intellect in March 2005 as Director of Telecommunications after a successful career as a Telecommunications Consultant. During that period he was an interim CTO for a North American startup company and was Programme Manager for the UMTS Forum. Other roles in the mobile sphere included due diligence and expert witness work. Prior to that, his career in BT was as General Manager of the BT Wireless Futures Team responsible for R&D, collaboration, trials and engagements with start-up companies looking at new technology. Before that he was in a corporate technology role looking at advanced second generation technologies, all third generation mobile technologies and wired and wireless access. During that period he was a member of the BT Wireless and BT Cellnet bid team responsible for technology associated with bids in the UK and other markets around the world. In the early 1990s he was in an operational role in BT Cellnet holding the post of CTO for six years during the rollout of analogue cellular and the start of GSM.

STEPHEN HEARNDEN STEPHEN He has published a number of articles during his career and has spoken at many conferences around the world. Stephen provides technical support for many of the programmes in Intellect. He is also a Director of the Information and Communications Technology Knowledge Transfer Network and a member of the Board of editors for the Journal of The Institute of Telecommunications Professionals. Stephen received his degree in Electronics in 1971 from the University of Kent following which he joined BT. He is a member of the Institution of Engineering and Technology and a Chartered Engineer.

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